The High Point Stake Program

Family History Goals vary from stake to stake. In our stake the Family History Goal is:

Over the next 3 years, the Family History Consultants

will have worked one-on-one

with all the active families* in the stake.

* That is, all the active families that choose to participate. If a family indicates they have no interest, that’s fine, the Family History Consultant will move on and help another family. This doesn’t preclude working with inactive families—it’s just that the initial goal is focused mainly on active families who are anxious to make progress working on their family history.

This goal comes from Elder D. Todd Christofferson’s recommendation on page 17 of the new Leader’s Guide to Temple and Family History Work regarding what he would consider a successful, well-run program. He says:

“If I were a bishop again I would charge the high priests group leader with the responsibility to lead out in the ward council on this subject. I would ensure that we had one or more family history consultants who were ‘people persons‘ who could work under his direction. I imagine that in the course of a year we could help at least ten families. In five years, we could have a corps of fifty families active at some level in family history and its attendant temple work. That to me would be a successful, well-run program.”

We’ve moved this up into a 3-year timeframe so that it corresponds with our other stake goals.

So, if a Family History Consultant (FHC) can effectively work with 10 families per year…

Thus, if a ward has 90 active families, they should consider having 3 Family History Consultants.

And, in the spirit of “teach correct principles and the people govern themselves,” we’re training families, giving them all the tools they need to be successful with their family history work, and then they’re off on their own determining what their individual involvement is going to be.

May the Lord bless us in this great work on behalf of our deceased ancestors and their families.